Knowledge
Technology has the potential to change the way our children learn.
Chitra Ravi found EZ Vidya in 2001 when even the government was not paying attention to ICT or digital intervention in teaching. Today, through its 2 software tools the company is catering to close to 800 schools and is looking to leverage proliferating mobile phones to spread its reach.
Today every school and educational institute bandies around words like smart classrooms, e-learning, digital boards, information and communication technology (ICT) in education. However, these words are relatively new— only 2 decades old. Today these smart classes or the digital intervention in classrooms has transformed the way teachers teach, students learn and the way assessment is done.
Let’s rewind back to 2001, when Chitra Ravi ventured into this e-learning or digital learning space.
“Initially when we would go to explain our ideas in schools, the first thing they would ask is if I hold a B.Ed (Bachelor of Education) degree,” says Chitra Ravi, founder and CEO of EZ Vidya. EZ Vidya’s business model is to create software to help children understand subjects and bring advanced digital learning to classrooms and finally conduct workshops for teachers.
The organization which offers products for students from kindergarten through Class VIII is focused on delivering quality holistic education in Indian schools and aims to address some of the challenges in the education system. “Schools are focused on covering the prescribed syllabus and don’t work on uncovering the education. Children tend to lose their curiosity once they get into the formal education system,” says Ravi, adding students are lacking in practical knowledge.
EZ Vidya’s Chrysalis Thinkroom tool offers curriculum that is both innovative as well as interactive. There second offering is Buzzle, an assessment tool. Buzzle, introduced in 2014, is a personalized learning and assessment app that allows children to play learning games on hand-held devices containing concepts taught in school. It also enables parents to see reports on their child’s ‘conceptual understanding’ and ‘skills’.
Founded in 2001, EZ Vidya has been nominated for the Digital Empowerment Foundation’s mBillionth awards 2016, in the Learning and Education category.
Today EZ Vidya has received the prestigious nomination; however, the start was not easy. Chitra Ravi who holds a masters in English and an MBA started EZ Vidya leaving behind a family business in furniture. Later in 2005, she underwent a 2-month training programme called Project Zero conducted by the Harvard University exclusively for educators.
The germ of founding an innovation organization came when she saw her kids spending almost 80% of their time in schools in rote learning, with no hands on experience.
“Initially the thought process was triggered by how pathetic computer education itself was. When we started, computer science was a relatively new field for children. But most of things were communicated to the children only through text books and not through a hands-on experience,” says Ravi. “You would find questions in a computer science book such as, which is the longest key on the keyboard rather than how the computing skills and literacy could be taught,” she adds.
When the ministry of human resource and development finally launched ICT in schools around December 2004, Chitra Ravi’s EZ Vidya was far ahead of the field and had already tried and tested its digital intervention programme. In 2010, when the ministry subsequently revised ICT to provide opportunities to secondary stage students to mainly build their capacity on ICT skills and learn through a computer-aided process, her firm was again ahead of the curve.
Starting off with a 5 member team, EZ Vidya today boasts of a staff of 130, catering to close to 800 schools across the country. “We have been able to gain huge credibility now. If I had to compare with what we started off more than a decade ago, we have grown in an unimaginable way,” says Chitra. The Chennai-based organization’s corporate partners are Wipro, IBM, American India Foundation, Dell and Nokia among others.
Though EZ Vidya has been the pioneer of digital innovation and intervention, Chitra believes that there is no alternative to the teachers and that tablets and gadgets cannot replace books.
Chitra feels that technology is indeed needed today but as a background process, where it would help in standardizing, scaling and in helping teachers.
“Education means a lot of pedagogy, understanding and logic. Technology is something that will only leverage on and it shouldn’t obstruct the learning process,” she adds.
Ravi feels that leveraging growth of smart phones has already begun playing a disrupting role in the education space. Also, the organization is looking for the right kind of funding and investors now.